Polyvinylchloride (PVC) is the accepted material for use as tubing in various medical applications, such as peritoneal dialysis, blood processing, chemotherapy and other uses. In such uses, a consumable is conveyed through the tubing from one location to another. For peritoneal dialysis (CAPD), for example, it is also the practice to replace a used dialysate bag with a new bag. This is accomplished by cutting through the PVC tubing leading from the used bag and then welding tubing from a new bag to the cut portion of the tubing so that one bag may replace another. PVC is also the generally accepted material for forming bags and other medical containers and is commonly used as tubing in food processing particularly for fluids and semi-solids. In addition, PVC is the material generally used for forming sheets and films for bacterial and virus exclusion. Despite its acceptance by the art, PVC has a number of disadvantages which would be desirable to overcome in such uses. For example, conventional PVC includes a plasticizer (DOP) which might leach into the solutions in the bag. Further, after PVC has leached its DOP, large volumes of PVC particulates are released. Other disadvantages will be later referred to.
In my U.S. Pat. No. 5,496,291 and application Ser. No. 08/803,779, filed Feb. 24, 1997, I disclose an ionomeric modified poly-ether-ester material which could be used as a substitute for polyvinylchloride. Other variations of that material are disclosed in application Ser. No. 08/742,046, filed Nov. 1, 1996 now, U.S. Pat. No. 5,733,268 and Ser. No. 08/790,192, filed Jan. 30, 1997 now, U.S. Pat. No. 5,928,216.